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| Michael Moorcock to write Doctor Who novel Doctor Who fans give a cautious welcome to veteran SF and fantasy author following BBC Books commissionAcclaimed science fiction writer Michael Moorcock has moved to calm the concerns of Doctor Who fans after he revealed he would be writing a new novel about the adventures of the Time Lord.Moorcock, author of nearly 100 books, ranging from science fiction to fantasy and literary fiction, announced on his website Multiverse that he had been approached by BBC Books to write a new Doctor Who novel for publication by next Christmas. "Still have to have talks etc with producers and publishers but we should be signing shortly. Should be fun," said the author, perhaps best known for his creation of anti-hero Elric of Melniboné, the doomed albino sorcerer-prince.He said he sensed "a suspicion of the 'outsider'" at the news from some Doctor Who fans, which he compared to the response "you used to get when someone with a reputation as a non-SF writer would decide to write an SF novel"."All I can answer to this is 'wait and see'. I'm certainly not a non-watcher," he said. "Neither am I someone who ascribes a kind of religiosity to an enthusiasm. This phenomenon crops up a lot, these days associated with SF/fantasy, Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter, Twilight and so on. I hate these presumptions of exclusivity either in my own corner of the literary world or elsewhere. Mike Kustow, once director of the Royal Shakespeare Co, described this as 'the anxious ownership syndrome', when faced with his first confrontation with SF fandom in Brighton 1968. He'd found the same sort of expression with Shakespeare fans when someone from 'outside' showed an interest."He stressed to Doctor Who fans that he had been watching the television show since it began, and had been approached to write scripts or stories for years because he was known to enjoy it. "Only recently did the time feel right to me to do one," he said. "I do have to submit it to editors so they can make sure it fits into the canon and this, of course, is understandable."Moorcock's own fans were delighted at the news ("It's two of my greatest heroes combining forces," said one Multiverse commentator), and expressed their hope that the author would be able to "at least hint" at the Multiverse – the many-layered alternate universes in which numerous Moorcock novels are set – in the Doctor Who book.As yet, however, the author was giving away nothing about the book's contents, although he did say that "since the Tom Baker series, a lot of my ideas crept into the stories and so in many ways I'll be writing a story which already echoes my own work."In September, it was revealed that Blackadder creator Richard Curtis would be writing an episode for the fifth series of Doctor Who, which will air next year starring new doctor Matt Smith.Science fiction, fantasy and horrorDoctor WhoAlison Floodguardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2009 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds feeds.guardian.co.uk |
Tech it to the max: great gift ideas From ebooks and music players, to smartphones and computer gizmos, there's gadgets for all – but it pays to research before you buyIf you're planning to give someone a gadget or gizmo for Christmas, be careful, or, if you can't manage that, at least make it cheap. Gadget geeks tend to know what they want, and they can be unreasonably fussy about what are, to rational people, minor differences in specification. But if you do want to surprise someone with a tech gift, there are plenty of options.One is the Kindle ebook reader, which Amazon.com – the US-based version of the shopping site – says is "the most wished for, the most gifted, and the number one bestselling product across all product categories on Amazon". It hasn't taken off in the UK, because the original version wasn't available here, and the newer, $259 model has only been shipping to the UK for about a month. Why the delay? The system is based on the idea you can buy books from Amazon and they arrive on the Kindle, so it needs access to a mobile phone network. (You're not charged separately for this.)Feel the burnHaving tried a new Kindle, I can attest to the fact that it works well as a portable book reader, and in the UK it also provides free access to Wikipedia. Also, while it has its limitations, it's both relatively rare and easily recognisable. This puts users one up on their fellow commuters.How many people actually need an ebook reader is another matter. Most of us have been getting by with a pocket organiser or PDA, or one of the newer mobile phones. In gift-giving terms, however, today's obvious alternative is the Apple iPod touch. The small screen means it's arguably not quite as good as an ebook reader, at least for novel-length texts, but it's dramatically better as an MP3 music player, portable games console, movie and photo viewer, and web browser.The third-generation iPod touch is the more affordable alternative to an iPhone, though it lacks the iPhone's camera, GPS and telephone connectivity, and neither device supports Flash. And having an iPod touch means you can listen to music and send emails without worrying about running the iPhone's battery flat.For people who just want a music player there are more affordable alternatives, including Apple's iPod nano range. Curiously, the fifth-generation nano includes the camera that the iPod touch lacks. But for music buffs, Sony's range of MP3 players is now worth considering, as they generally sound better than iPods, and most or all of them ship with better earbuds.Sony has taken a bit of a beating over the past decade, for supporting its own Atrac audio compression (used in the MiniDisc system) and its unlovely PC software, Sonic Stage. The newer Sony MP3 players don't use either. Plug them into any computer's USB port and you can use drag-and-drop to copy music files across under Windows, Mac OS X or Linux. Playing a folder full of classical music tracks is easier than trying to manage them using iTunes, though you'll probably want to renumber the tracks in multidisc sets.While Sony has received lots of attention for its high-end X range of music players, it now has a small clip-style MP3 player that's hard to beat. The NWZ B143B USB Walkman stores 4GB of songs for £29.99 and works like a thumbdrive: you plug it into a USB port. Although you can get similar "off-brand" MP3 players for less, the Sony has a quick recharge feature: three minutes of USB recharging provides about three hours of play time.Mobile phones have also made a huge impact on the photographic business, and smartphones often include cameras that capture images with 5 megapixels or more. But they also tend to have very small image sensors, which means image quality doesn't really compare with compact cameras, let alone with consumer-level digital DLR cameras.Watching the detectivesAt the moment, one of the most attractive compacts is the Samsung ES55, a 10.2MP camera for under £75. It's a point-and-shoot model with a 2x optical zoom, but it also has face detection (to get people in focus), blink and smile detection, and image stabilisation (to reduce blur). It even has a Beauty Shot feature to lighten and smooth your subject's skin. Although it's also available in black, silver and grey, I suspect a lot of its users will want the pink version.Other compact cameras worth a look include the slimline Canon Digital Ixus range and the Panasonic Lumix models, particularly the TZ7 (£229). This has a 25mm wide-angle Leica lens with a 12x optical zoom and lots of electronic features for simple picture taking; it also takes high-def movies (1280 x 720 pixels) in AVCHD LiteFor people who just want to take simple movies, the Flip Ultra HD is the popular choice. Flip, now owned by Cisco, popularised very small Flash-based point-and-shoot camcorders, and remains the market leader. The Ultra HD comes in two versions – you can have 4GB (£90) or 8GB (£120) of storage – and is small enough to carry everywhere. It's great for capturing things for sharing on YouTube, or posting on blogs, and even a child can use one.But the Flip Ultra's simplicity comes with a lack of versatility. The lens is fixed-focus, there's no optical zoom, and the camera is hard to hold still – there's no built-in image stabilisation. Someone who wants to make movies would be much better off buying a more conventional digital camcorder from Canon, Sony, Panasonic or similar company. The Panasonic SDR-S26 (£170), for example, has a 70x zoom lens, image stabilisation, face detection and a night-view mode. It uses SD cards for storage, so you don't need to be near a PC.There are also plenty of high-definition (HD) models around now, at more affordable prices. A good example is the Panasonic HDC-SD10 (£313), but buying and using an HD camcorder needs a bit more research than picking up a Flip Ultra HD.Widening the netWhen it comes to computers, netbooks are an attractive option as they are relatively cheap and work as companion PCs for people who already have larger notebooks and desktops. It's also a market where model ranges change quickly, so older netbooks are often available at substantial discounts.This Christmas, Samsung looks likely to continue the success it enjoyed with its first netbook, the NC10, which offered a good specification and decent build quality at a reasonable price. That has now been upgraded to the N130, which is available in black, white and pink, and still runs Windows XP. The keyboard, 10.1in screen and lightweight design (1.3kg) make it very good value at a discount price of around £229. There's also a slightly more luxurious N140 version with better battery life for an extra £50.Asus, which kicked off the netbook market with its Eee PC range, now has the thin ultraportable 1005HA Seashell (£250), which offers an "isolated keyboard" – spaced out flat keys – and "up to 10 hours" battery life, against the Samsung's claimed six hours. In other respects, the systems are similar and neither would disappoint.The computer industry also provides thousands of peripherals that could be potential gifts, including monitors, keyboards, mice, webcams, and thumbdrives. But the one thing almost everyone wants is more external hard drive space, and terabyte (1TB) drives are now available for less than £70. An external hard drive isn't the most romantic gift, but it's one that will actually get used, rather than ending up in a drawer – or at Oxfam!GadgetsAppleAmazon.comiPhoneiPodSonyEbooksYouTubeJack Schofieldguardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2009 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds feeds.guardian.co.uk |
Essay: Steal These Books At independent bookstores, thieves are more likely to be following Abbie Hoffman than the Ten Commandments. feeds.nytimes.com |
Paperback Trade Fiction Top 5 at a Glance1. THE LOVELY BONES, by Alice Sebold2. THE GIRL WITH THE DRAGON TATTOO, by Stieg Larsson3. PUSH, by Sapphire4. THE PIANO TEACHER, by Janice Y.K. Lee5. THE SHACK, by William P. Young feeds.nytimes.com |
Introducing Burns Robert Burns was born in Alloway in Ayrshire, and died in Dumfries. He had watched his father worn down by authority, and worn out by labour. This radicalised him, and turned Burns into an enemy of all enemies of freedom and humanity. Such egalitarian ideals got him into trouble: he was excited by outbreak of revolution in France, and his indiscreet support nearly lost him his job as an exciseman. Burns' songs enjoy an international popularity, but what's often admired in his poetry is his liberal sloganeering; however, the best of his poems shed a far more sophisticated light on the species. (I can think of no wiser dissection of the slippery nature of human morality and temptation than Address to the Unco Guid, for example.)Burns was such a complex individual that everyone is free to make their own reading of him, according to their own agenda. Whatever you want to see, you'll find: a crude boor and brilliant raconteur; a male chauvinist pig and a champion of the rights of women; an Ayrshire farmer and an Edinburgh sophisticate; an abolitionist and a supporter of the slave trade (he almost left Scotland to work on a plantation in the West Indies); a bad English late-Augustan poet, and a brilliant Scots early Romantic. Attempts to make a simplified reading of Burns' verse are similarly doomed. One myth, though, we can swiftly dispatch. He may have been complicit, when it suited him, in the proclamation of his noble savagery; but Burns was no "heaven-taught ploughman". He was a quick-witted and thoroughly well-read man, who (Paxo take note) would have torn any of us to shreds in intellectual argument.The same thing lies behind his multiple personalities as behind his universal appeal: the neurotic desire to be all things to all men, and especially all women. But none of this would have meant a thing without his huge natural talent. His gift for broad address was achieved by his having organised his language, through a remarkable feat of the literary intellect, into a smooth continuum that ran from low Ayrshire Scots to high Johnsonian English, effectively constructing one of the largest linguistic resources any poet has ever had at their disposal. (Burns' Scots, contrary to popular belief, is anything but pure.)More important, though, is what Burns actually said with it. Burns' central insight is that the spiritual, the social, the sexual, the natural, the political and the humorous are overlapping human realms, not separate or competing ones. To pretend otherwise is a lie. If you sang one, you should sing them all. Through his humane, funny, impassioned, acutely-observed and often brilliantly argued verse, Burns shows us that if we keep those realms continually in dialogue, each tempers, civilises and refines the laws of the others. Out of all this, a crucial moral distinction emerges: hypocritical behaviour becomes far less forgivable, merely inconsistent behaviour far more so. Holy Willie is destroyed by Burns for his hypocrisy, not his inconsistency. Man is complicated, is Burns' truest song – and heaven knows, no man was ever more qualified to sing it.Burns was a notorious womaniser – or a great lover, if you prefer, which is no doubt how he saw it. This career was brought to a sharp halt in Edinburgh by the brilliant, beautiful, bourgeois (and chaste) Nancy McLehose. His failure with Nancy taught him that his low pedigree would forever count against him, and he retreated to Ayr to live with his family, and resume work as an exciseman. His career as a poet was essentially over; whatever the subject of his poems, it was always love that had fired the engine. Thereafter, he redirected his amorous energies into song-making. However the songs are astonishing: Burns assuaged his fragmented personality by projecting it into a vast and partly anonymous work, and his revitalisation of Scottish song was so pervasive its extent can never be fully known. The work was so skillfully executed that, 200 years later, the songs are still going strong. Though the songs aren't poems, as I suspect he'd have been the first to tell you. They need singing (nor do his poems work when set to music: there's far too much music in them already). No one, though, could listen to Ae Fond Kiss and doubt that a great poet had a hand in it.Many of us dread Burns Night. Address to a bloody Haggis; recitations of Tam O'Shanter that should, by rights, have their speakers automatically sectioned or arrested; much talk of "our Rabbie" – but as Hugh McDiarmid said: "No wan in 50 kens a wurd Burns wrote / But misapplied is aabody's property". It also affords us the yearly opportunity to hear him belittled and traduced in the media, and listen to the very folk who should be championing him – Hattersley and Paxman, to name two – laugh him away, based on their own poor understanding of the poems and their impatience with its alien diction. Dr Starkey's criticisms seem to be more broadly anti-Scottish, and therefore impossible to take seriously. Robert Burns died of being Robert Burns, as Stevenson remarked, and in many ways has died of him ever since. But he was good enough for Keats, and for Wordsworth, and for Hazlitt – "Burns was not like Shakespeare in the range of his genius; but there is something of the same magnanimity, directness, and unaffected character about him" – and he should be good enough for us.Robert BurnsPoetryDon Patersonguardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds feeds.guardian.co.uk |